id and Zenimax, Sitting in a Tree

Zenimax Media (the parent/shell company of Elder Scrolls/Fallout developers Bethesda Softworks) have, in a move surprising to everybody ever, aquired id Software. This means that while Rage and Wolfenstein will still be published by EA and Activision respectively, Bethesda will publish Doom 4.

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I'm pretty sure thta even if they wanted to, they couldn't rob Doom source ports of their GPL status. Otherwise they would probably have forced it on ports that wouldn't go for it when they relicensed the source to GPL in the first place.

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Probably, although id never confirmed on their site that Doom is under the GPL, and they don't host a version of the source under the GPL on their server. But yeah, since Carmack himself is openly using the license for iDoom, things should be okay.

In any case, it leaves Carmack with a load of money, that can further his rocket developments.

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I am at an absolute loss for words... nothing can say how disgusted and disappointed I am. This confirms what I said in that last thread, ID is past their prime, and they will surely die very soon because of this.

Zenimax is a very very shitty company and ID's future games will suffer greatly because of it. It's a very sad thing, and I have completely lost respect for John for doing this.

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Well, I enjoy the Elder Scrolls games, and I enjoy id games. However the last id game I really loved was Quake, so I can't say I'm that destroyed by the merger. Maybe it'll actually help id to start making great games again, or help zenimax/bethesda create games that both look good, and aren't bug ridden. I doubt they're going to be that intertwined though, aside from profit sharing, and it means id doesn't have to spend time whoring their games out to publishers. I doubt anything will change, and if it does it will probably be for the better. Still, I hope zenimax realizes id's next game will have a hard fought road ahead of it to overcome Doom 3.

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or help zenimax/bethesda create games that both look good, and aren't bug ridden.

My concern is that because Bethesda makes very bug ridden games, this will happen to id's games too now. Their games were always perfect on release (with very few minor patches after) But Beth? No major bugs were fixed in any patches they released and they pretty much leave their games to rot after that with no further support. They are very far from being goods matches for each other.

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Doom 4 will probably be better for it. Like Carmack said, it gives them better resources to do what they want. Zenimax probably won't have any more influence than EA or Activision has on their current games. Otherwise he wouldn't have agreed with it. No one would have.

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I think a lot of people are missing the point of what this deal means: Id software now has a worldwide publisher for its 360 titles as a child company and they have financial backing for all future products. Furthermore, they can just re-allocate in house talent from project to project, meaning they bring on people who know what their doing and don't have to be brought up to speed on the ways of id. Its said that this will change nothing else in the way id does it's activities.

That being said, the id we knew of died after quake III (or maybe it was dead before then). They have shifted their primary focus in-house off of the pc and on to consoles, put out maybe 2.5 new (debatable) games since 2001 and boasted their pride on how exclusive their tech has been across the industry (as opposed to unreal). I guess this is just another inevitable step that the magic that surrounded them has passed and that they are just another game company to many of us now.

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I'm a little confused here. Is that really an acquisition or a partnership if ZeniMax is only there to support financially and publish games for id? Typically, in most cases, an acquisition involves name changing and I hope the name "id" stays

If the company lives up to the words stated in the article, I think some of you are overworried about certain aspects. Carmack still remains as technical director. He's smart enough not to make a game full of bugs. It's also said that most key people at id remain in positions continuing to operate as usual so I don't see if this business change will impact the future quality of games.

In fact, I think some of you are whining too much that you're dwelling too much on the old id games. The gaming world has moved away and on to a new generation long ago. If you don't like it, then stop playing. There's always new blood coming in for support. We live in a world full of commericials with business decisions in weigh, it's inevitable to stop the change. Learn to deal and live with it

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Besides that, I bet Activision has been ripping off a lot of commissions from partnering with id in the past and especially during this recession period, it has become more demanding from Activision. This is a very wise move by id, although I'm sure Carmack has enough money backing to save the company if it were in financial trouble.